"Tell him I can't come, Flaherty!" he called over his shoulder. "I'm busy."
"I reckon that's so, Doc," said the foreman. "Why don't you haul him in? That pole of yours ain't no good, it's too limber. If I had him on mine I'd show you how to get him in."
"Oh, you would, would you, dad burn you," remarked Doctor Barnes, who had small love for the human race at many times, and less at this moment. "I wouldn't put it past you. Well, this is my affair and not yours. Who is the fellow, anyhow, and where did he come from, and what does he want? Has he been trying to beat the shot?"
"He ain't on our job," replied the foreman. "Come down from twenty mile up the East Fork. Got kicked by a horse."
"Huh! What's his name? Look at him jump!" remarked the doctor, with mixed emotions and references.
"Sim Gage. Come down with a feller name of Gardner that lives up in there."
"Oh, above on the East Fork? Say, how's the fishing up there?—Did they say there were any grayling in there?"
"I've saw Wid Gardner lots of times before, and he says a feller can always get a sackful of grayling any time he wants to, in there, come summer time."
"Look at him go! Ain't that fine?" inquired Dr. Allen Barnes. "Did he say they were coming good now, up there? Ain't he a peach?"
"Yes, Wid said the grayling was risin' right good now," said Flaherty. "But this feller, Sim Gage, his leg looks to me like you'd have to cut it off. Can I help, Doc?—I never seen a man's leg cut off, not in my whole life."